Hunters seem to be in a very good place right now when everyone is 550 and normal modes. Although I can't really say this is accurate since I haven't seen any heroic mechanics, but we should keep in mind that hunters were also very strong in normal modes in T15, but heroic changes a lot of mechanics or adds more stuff to kill that hunters weren't able to take advantage of like other classes. Not to mention scaling etc.

So after doing 11/14 in my first SoO raid tonight, I feel that we're not as bad as some of us had initially thought. Yes, we have our problems and yes, I am not saying we're 'fine' either, but BM played out really well so far and I'm quite pleased with the results. Our legendary cloak also feels a bit more powerful than than its melee counterpart.

One underlooked thing is definitely the focus removal of dash/dive, which makes it really nice when it comes to switching targets - this was extremely noticeable on fights like Thok and even Fallen Protectors.

I cant put my finger on it but it seems like BM is significantly outperforming SV so far(7 bosses in). Generally speaking, we are certainly in a better spot compared to 5.3 as GC said we would be and our legendary cloak seems to play big part in it. However, our gap isnt huge enough to make up for awful scaling thus pretty certain we will start falling behind few weeks in.

Why? The adds have so little health that having your pet hit them would be redundant.

Blink Strikes because aMoC duration is too long and won't tick completely when the boss reformed the first time.
BM Because it has a 1 minute DPS cooldown, allowing you do put out more boss damage overall when accounting for the downtime phases.

Only about half-way through normal SoO and so far I am getting better results with SV (10 man) despite playing BM 90% of the time since MoP launch (and parsing 90+ percentile). 549 ilevel, only SoO pieces are WF AoC and a ring.

Maybe I'm doing something wrong but I don't think so. FD is showing BM with a 5k DPS lead on SV (Crit>Haste>Mastery on both) but in-game on dummies and bosses I'm getting significantly better results as SV.

Here's what I can share so far on 25m side(we are 12/14N as of today):

Immerseus: Either spec works just fine, if you wipe here, I think you have bigger concerns than what spec you should play
Panda Council: SV with Barrage for multi-dotting/cleave(at least we kept all Pandas apart)
Norushen: For 25m, more adds spawn so Barrage should be better overall. I was SV for our kill
Sha of Pride: Single target with burst AoE needs; BM
Galakras: If you are on Tower duty, I would suggest SV, pets are very annoying here. I was BM even though I was on tower duty
Iron Juggernaut: Pure single target nuke; BM
Dark Shaman: SV with Barrage, I was assigned as 1 of the ooze killers(we took the ooze boss far away from the other and assigned a few good AoE DPS to kill them there)
General Nazgrim: Was benched for this guy to let others get loot and stuff, but I assume SV with Barrage if you aren't allowed to tunnel boss.
Malkorok: Again pure single target; BM
Spoils: I was BM here, adds are gathered around tank, Beast Cleave is king.
Thok: BM definitely, managed to do a bit over 250k on this guy.
Blackfuse: I was on Assembly Line(and you as a Hunter will 99% likely be as well!), SV with GT, pets are very bad for this one.

Paragons: No Info, but assuming each boss heals to full after you kill 1, BM would be the way to go
Garrosh: Not entirely sure, SV is probably a good one here due to AoE and target switching.

Dark Shaman: I prefer BM/Barrage. It's burst AoE on clumped up adds, and otherwise single-target. SV can DoT both bosses, but I seriously doubt that makes up for the lower single-target or the lack of good burst AoE.

Nazgrim: Either is fine. BM allows you better boss damage at the expense of smooth target swaps to adds. I played SV for our kill, our other 2 Hunters played BM. I came out on top marginally. I think I'd prefer Glaive here, there isn't that much AoE going on aside from the pull.

Spoils: Either. I'd be interested in finding out if the WW buff is affected by SV mastery. If it is, I think I'd prefer SV for this.

Blackfuse: Depends on your role. I actually really liked BM for the conveyor belts. You get WAY better burst, allowing you to send fewer players up and leave more to deal with Crawler Mines. I had zero pet issues on the conveyor belts. If you're not going up (hint: you probably should be), you'll likely want to be SV with Binding Shot to basically be on Crawler Mine CC bitch duty. We're extremely good at handling these with our solid target switching, slow traps, Binding Shot, concussive, etc.

Dark Shaman: I prefer BM/Barrage. It's burst AoE on clumped up adds, and otherwise single-target. SV can DoT both bosses, but I seriously doubt that makes up for the lower single-target or the lack of good burst AoE.

Nazgrim: Either is fine. BM allows you better boss damage at the expense of smooth target swaps to adds. I played SV for our kill, our other 2 Hunters played BM. I came out on top marginally. I think I'd prefer Glaive here, there isn't that much AoE going on aside from the pull.

Spoils: Either. I'd be interested in finding out if the WW buff is affected by SV mastery. If it is, I think I'd prefer SV for this.

Blackfuse: Depends on your role. I actually really liked BM for the conveyor belts. You get WAY better burst, allowing you to send fewer players up and leave more to deal with Crawler Mines. I had zero pet issues on the conveyor belts. If you're not going up (hint: you probably should be), you'll likely want to be SV with Binding Shot to basically be on Crawler Mine CC bitch duty. We're extremely good at handling these with our solid target switching, slow traps, Binding Shot, concussive, etc.

I'll be doing Klaxxi/Garrosh tonight, so more info to follow.

Klaxxi/Garrosh for us too, but on Monday.

Anyway the reason I went SV on Dark Shaman, is that we take the blob add boss towards the path where you go to Nazgrim and keep it there for the rest of the fight, we had Me(Hunter), Ele Shaman and Demo Lock killing the adds. This mean that the rest of the raid only had to deal with the other boss and avoiding shit.

Also I was afraid to go BM since if my pet got aggro on the small blobs, it would die horribly. Anyway, Fervor+Barrage line up VERY nicely for Blobs, massive burst AoE through those.

Blackfuse: Depends on your role. I actually really liked BM for the conveyor belts. You get WAY better burst, allowing you to send fewer players up and leave more to deal with Crawler Mines. I had zero pet issues on the conveyor belts. If you're not going up (hint: you probably should be), you'll likely want to be SV with Binding Shot to basically be on Crawler Mine CC bitch duty. We're extremely good at handling these with our solid target switching, slow traps, Binding Shot, concussive, etc.

Just a note on this, it does seem like pets have problems catching up to the weapons as they are moving. But, I had no problem soloing the conveyor belt in normal. Heroic seems to require 2.

Yeah I'm using Skada, can't however check logs exactly as they are bugged, can't be arsed to start searching through the entire thing(Malkorok-Spoils-Thok-Blackfuse). My iLvl atm is 551, got the WF gun from Malkorok and before that I got WF belt from Galakras(hit/haste one).

And yeah, I had issues with pets getting stuck. Most notably the crates that are in the corners and you haven't opened the crates next to it. Master's Call gets your pet out easily, just have to hope it doesn't get bugged again..

I'm finding BM really strong, beast cleave burst is really OP and I'm generally coming top 3, or 2 behind our op lock. The gap between survival and BM is just going to get bigger IMO as we get gear. On thok on Sunday looking for a clear.

The only reason that misconception exists is because of our old stat priority of crit > mastery > haste (before rppm).. And before the beast cleave buff.. At that point, with how mastery and crit synergizes with SrS, SV aoe was just god like.. BM couldn't touch it.. But that has changed. With how little mastery we take now, srs doesn't do a whole lot. Straight up, BM >> SV on aoe.. whether it be burst or even sustained..